Meanwhile, by assimilating the Other into our own modes of representation of reality and imagination, twentieth-century female writers of the fantastic show how alternative identities can be shaped and social constituencies can be challenged."--BOOK JACKET.

Lawrence Venuti, winner of a Guggenheim fellowship and the Global Humanities Translation Prize, among many other awards, has translated into English these Italian Gothic tales of obsessive love, mysterious phobias, and the hellish curse of everlasting life. In this collection of nine eerie stories, Iginio Ugo Tarchetti switches effortlessly between the macabre and the breezily comical. Set in nineteenth-century Italy, his characters court spirits and blend in with the undead: passionate romances filled with jealousy and devotion are fueled by magic elixirs. Time becomes fluid as characters travel between centuries, chasing affairs that never quite prosper. First published by Mercury House in 1992.

This collection of thirteen essays brings together Italian and American scholars to present a cooperative analysis of the Italian short story, beginning in the fourteenth century with Giovanni Boccaccio and arriving at the twentieth century with Alberto Moravia and Anna Maria Ortese. Throughout the book, the contributors carefully and intentionally unpack and explain the development of the short story genre and demonstrate the breadth of themes – cultural, historical and linguistic – detailed in these narratives. Dedicated to a genre “devoted to lightness and flexibility, as well as quickness, exactitude, visibility and multiplicity,” this collection paints a careful and exacting picture of an important part of both Italian and literary history.

The "Gothic" style was a key trend in Italian cinema of the 1950s and 1960s because of its peculiar, often strikingly original approach to the horror genre. These films portrayed Gothic staples in a stylish and idiosyncratic way, and took a daring approach to the supernatural and to eroticism, with the presence of menacing yet seductive female witches, vampires and ghosts. Thanks to such filmmakers as Mario Bava (Black Sunday), Riccardo Freda (The Horrible Dr. Hichcock), and Antonio Margheriti (Castle of Blood), as well the iconic presence of actress Barbara Steele, Italian Gothic horror went overseas and reached cult status. The book examines the Italian Gothic horror of the period, with an abundance of previously unpublished production information drawn from official papers and original scripts. Entries include a complete cast and crew list, home video releases, plot summary and the author's analysis. Excerpts from interviews with filmmakers, scriptwriters and actors are included. The foreword is by film director and scriptwriter Ernesto Gastaldi.

THE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF THE GOTHIC “Well written and interesting [it is] a testament to the breadth and depth of knowledge about its central subject among the more than 130 contributing writers, and also among the three editors, each of whom is a significant figure in the field of gothic studies ... A reference work that’s firmly rooted in and actively devoted to expressing the current state of academic scholarship about its area.” New York Journal of Books “A substantial achievement.” Reference Reviews Comprehensive and wide-ranging, The Encyclopedia of the Gothic brings together over 200 newly-commissioned essays by leading scholars writing on all aspects of the Gothic as it is currently taught and researched, along with challenging insights into the development of the genre and its impact on contemporary culture. The A-Z entries provide comprehensive coverage of relevant authors, national traditions, critical developments, and notable texts that continue to define, shape, and inform the genre. The volume’s approach is truly interdisciplinary, with essays by specialist international contributors whose expertise extends beyond Gothic literature to film, music, drama, art, and architecture. From Angels and American Gothic to Wilde and Witchcraft, The Encyclopedia of the Gothic is the definitive reference guide to all aspects of this strange and wondrous genre. The Wiley-Blackwell Encyclopedia of Literature is a comprehensive, scholarly, authoritative, and critical overview of literature and theory comprising individual titles covering key literary genres, periods, and sub-disciplines. Available both in print and online, this groundbreaking resource provides students, teachers, and researchers with cutting-edge scholarship in literature and literary studies.

The Gothic is wildly diverse. It can refer to ecclesiastical architecture, supernatural fiction, cult horror films, and a distinctive style of rock music. It has influenced political theorists and social reformers, as well as Victorian home décor and contemporary fashion. Nick Groom shows how the Gothic has come to encompass so many meanings by telling the story of the Gothic from the ancient tribe who sacked Rome to the alternative subculture of the present day. This unique Very Short Introduction reveals that the Gothic has predominantly been a way of understanding and responding to the past. Time after time, the Gothic has been invoked in order to reveal what lies behind conventional history. It is a way of disclosing secrets, whether in the constitutional politics of seventeenth-century England or the racial politics of the United States. While contexts change, the Gothic perpetually regards the past with fascination, both yearning and horrified. It reminds us that neither societies nor individuals can escape the consequences of their actions. The anatomy of the Gothic is richly complex and perversely contradictory, and so the thirteen chapters here range deliberately widely. This is the first time that the entire story of the Gothic has been written as a continuous history: from the historians of late antiquity to the gardens of Georgian England, from the mediaeval cult of the macabre to German Expressionist cinema, from Elizabethan Revenge Tragedy to American consumer society, from folk ballads to vampires, from the past to the present. ABOUT THE SERIES: The Very Short Introductions series from Oxford University Press contains hundreds of titles in almost every subject area. These pocket-sized books are the perfect way to get ahead in a new subject quickly. Our expert authors combine facts, analysis, perspective, new ideas, and enthusiasm to make interesting and challenging topics highly readable.

Elsa Morante’s Politics of Writing is a collected volume of twenty-one essays written by Morante specialists and international scholars. Essays gather attention on four broad critical topics, namely the relationship Morante entertained with the arts, cinema, theatre, and the visual arts; new critical approaches to her four novels; treatment of body and sexual politics; and Morante’s prophetic voice as it emerges in both her literary works and her essayistic writings. Essays focus on Elsa Morante’s strategies to address her wide disinterest (and contempt) for the Italian intellectual status quo of her time, regardless of its political side, while showing at once her own kind of ideological commitment. Further, contributors tackle the ways in which Morante’s writings shape classical oppositions such as engagement and enchantment with the world, sin and repentance, self-reflection, and corporality, as well as how her engagement in the visual arts, theatre, and cinematic adaptations of her works garner further perspectives to her stories and characters. Her works—particularly the novels Menzogna e sortilegio (House of Liars, 1948), La Storia: Romanzo (History: A Novel, 1974) and, more explicitly, Aracoeli (Aracoeli, 1982)—foreshadowed and advanced tenets and structures later affirmed by postmodernism, namely the fragmentation of narrative cells, rhizomatic narratives, lack of a linear temporal consistency, and meta- and self-reflective processes.

Filippo Tommaso Marinetti: The Artist and His Politics explores the politics of the leader of the Futurist art movement. Emerging in Italy in 1909, Futurism sought to propel Italy into the modern world, and is famously known for outlandish claims to want to destroy museums and libraries in order to speed this transition. Futurism, however, also had a much darker political side. It glorified war as the solution to many of Italy’s ills, and was closely tied to the Fascist Regime. In this book, Ialongo focuses on Marinetti as the chief determinant of Futurist politics and explores how a seemingly revolutionary art movement, at one point having some support among revolutionary left-wing movements in Italy, could eventually become so intimately tied to the repressive Fascist regime. Ialongo traces Marinetti’s politics from before the foundation of Futurism, through the Great War, and then throughout the twenty-year Fascist dictatorship, using a wide range of published and unpublished sources. Futurist politics are presented within the wider context of developments in Italy and Europe, and Ialongo further highlights how Marinetti’s political choices influenced the art of his movement.

The Cultures of Italian Migration allows the adjective "Italian" to qualify people's movements along diverse trajectories and temporal dimensions. Discussions on migrations to and from Italy meet in that discursive space where critical concepts like"home," "identity," "subjectivity," and "otherness" eschew stereotyping. This volume demonstrates that interpretations of old migrations are necessary in order to talk about contemporary Italy. New migrations trace new non linear paths in the definitionof a multicultural Italy whose roots are unmistakably present throughout the centuries. Some of these essays concentrate on topics that are historically long-term, such as emigration from Italy to the Americas and southern Pacific Ocean. Others focus on the more contemporary phenomena of immigration to Italy from other parts of the world, including Africa. This collection ultimately offers an invitation to seek out new and different modes of analyzing the migratory act.

This new collection gathers together 45 of Stableford's best critical reviews on works of science fiction, fantasy, horror, decadent literature, and nonfiction books about these topics. His comments are witty, intelligent, and full of insight. Complete with comprehensive index.